Mudblood
by Magdalenara
Summary: This is set after the 7.1 film, but before they get into Hogwarts:  They are out in the woods, Hermione is confronted with her situation of being a Mudblood and Ron tries to console her...I just wanted to explore the whole Mudblood thing a wee bit more!


**Mudblood**

**K**

The wind howled outside the tent and pulled stubbornly at the fabric of their temporary home, but it didn't give in. Like a bright rock in the darkness, it remained strong, covering the three young people from the coldness of that night. Harry Potter, The Boy Who Lived, looked absently into the little fiery balls that Hermione had produced before she left to get some fresh water. Her magic never failed them when they needed it most and so he sighed relieved while the warmth helped him to relax and to gather his thoughts about the next Horcrux. Meanwhile Ron fumbled at the ancient radio again, switching the channels like a madman looking for any signs of living coming from this dead as hell object. Harry could hardly believe he still got it, after all this radio was of the most medieval technology and Ron was not the most well-versed in electronics anyway, especially not Muggle-technologies.

All of the sudden, a sound made Harry startle and he glanced over to Ron whose face brightened up like the sun after a week of rain and blizzards. A distorted, distant voice came out of the boxes of the radio, the words hardly understandable, the tone switching from high-pitched sounds to dark, deep buzz. But it was working, it was...working. It was _working_?

Ron turned to him with the proudest look on his face he'd ever seen, like a little boy who'd finally managed it to sneak the sweets out of his Mum's pockets, despite she'd hid them so carefully from him.

"Told ya I could make it work again. My charm is purely irresistible for electronic devices." he joked and harvested a contemptuous but warm laugh from Harry.

"Yeah, you're brilliant, mate, you're bloody James Bond.".

Ron's face lightened up as he heard the praise but then it automatically vanished, he was just about to ask who this _James-Bond-guy_ was when the voice from the radio suddenly changed. There was a creaking sound that made them shudder heavily and then another voice came out of boxes.

"_Good evening, my brothers and sisters of the Pure Blood._

_The time has finally come that the _Dark Lord_ arises to wash away the soiled shame of our past. _

_Filthy little _Squibs_ and _Mudbloods_, bastardised offspring of two races that could not be more different, like humans and animals, eagles and vermin. A degraded, deformed kind, half-humans, unworthy of a wand, unworthy of the title of a wizard or a witch!..._".

Both of them turned around quickly when they heard a sound behind them and Ron's heart tightened when he saw Hermione standing in the tent's entrance. He felt this well-known lump in his throat when he saw the expression on her face. The pain, the shame, the anger and the feeling of being inferior. All those emotions rushed over face, way too quickly to read them all. He rushed quickly to the radio in order to turn this Death Eater's message off, but he startled again when he felt the unfamiliar touch of her hand on his forearm.

Hermione was at his side and softly pulled his hand back before she replaced it with her shaking fingers and simply pumped up the volume.

"_...The time has come to make an end to a world where every Muggle-Bastard with a broken wand can call himself a wizard. The danger of those _Mudbloods_ can only be defeated by shedding their filthy, muddy blood. The time has come to arise and fight, my brothers and sisters, and fight we will._

_A time has come that will never be forgot!_".

When the voice echoed in the rustling and cracking of the radio sounds, slowly fading into nowhere, it left both Harry and Ron in a disgusted shudder and in a hateful rage that almost blinded them. Ron looked to the Hermione, but he couldn't see her face, only her back. However, in the way her shoulders shook lightly he knew she was shivering. Pain twisted in his guts when he believed to have heard sobs coming from her.

_Hell_, he couldn't stand crying girls and he could bear it even less when Hermione, _his_ Hermione, cried. After all, she was the rock of their trio, the band that'd chained them together, right from the beginning. If it hadn't been for her, he would have never come back. Seeing her now weak and defenceless scared the hell out of him. It scared him, outraged him. It tore his heart apart and he felt the instant impulse to protect her. Ron lifted his arm and placed it on her shoulder to comfort her, but before he could say anything she shook his hand off and stormed out of the tent.

For a moment he was unsure of what to do, he looked back to Harry who raised his eyebrows in his typical way, like pointing his nose to something blindingly obvious. Ron opened his mouth to say something, but then he reflected a better and rushed out of the tent, trying to keep up to Hermione.

"Good boy." Harry chuckled lightly and grabbed one of Hermiones many books.

Outside the tent, Ron looked around, for a moment blinded by the thick darkness of this forest's night, before he finally spotted Hermione sitting on a tree's trunk not far away from the tent, but far enough to be out of earshot. She looked so small in the darkness, so alone and broken that it stirred his heart. Slowly he approached her, he stood hesitantly behind her for a few moments and tried to figure out if she was still crying. However, the forest was quiet and so was she. He then mustered up all his grit and set himself next to her.

Ron looked straight into the depth of the night, obviously searching for the right words to start and to comfort her. When he'd finally made up his mind of what to say she again beat him to it.

"You people really think that the end of this war will change a thing?" she suddenly said, her voice sounded strangely thin and hoarse, lacking the usual confidence and stubbornness that determined her character.

"It changes nothing. Not for me at least.".

Ron, silenced by the unusual weak tone in her voice, took her words all in, feeling the heavy weight of every syllable.

"So, you don't believe that we can win this fight?".

"Of course, I do, Ronald Weasley. " she snapped and turned her furiously dark brown eyes towards him, but when she saw how he twitched back by the tone of her voice she calmed down. Her look fell away from him and again he couldn't see the brown of her eyes.

"No matter if we win this war, it won't change anything for me. I will remain..._impure_.

After this war I will still be a _Mudblood_.".

Her voice broke at the end of the sentence and he turned his eyes to her, following the movement of her right hand which rubbed unconsciously on her forearm. Ron knew what lay beneath the layers of fabric, he'd seen the letters that Lestrange had mercilessly carved into her flesh. He remembered her screams...

Since that day, she was constantly caressing these letters that still burnt on her skin and in her very soul. _Mudblood_. Thinking this word alone felt disgusting, it outraged him, it pained him. He knew she wouldn't forget. The wound of Lestrange simply wouldn't want to heal, no matter what they tried. Perhaps she didn't even want it to heal.

"You can never know..._if_ we win this war...

_When_ we win this war, none of this will matter any more. The Death Eaters won't be any longer. _HE_ won't be any longer. No one will ever call you..._that_." he whispered softly, his voice breaking at the edge while he watched her face intensely. A light movement of her lips indicated something like a smile, but it was too weak to reassure him.

"It does not matter how they call me, Ron. When they look at me they do not see a witch, they see a muggle-born witch, a _Mudblood_. They'll always see that I'm different. Not like them. Not as _good_ as them. Whenever they talk of me, they'll say 'She did this and that _despite_ being muggle-born'.".

She fell silent again and Ron joined her tranquillity, listening to her soft breathing, feeling the warmth that flooded from her body at his side to him.

At some point he dared to turn his eyes to her again, but her look was cast down while she still subconsciously rubbed over the painful wound. Although he couldn't see her brown eyes, the truth hit him hard nonetheless. _She felt ashamed_. He could see it in the way she pulled up her shoulders, the way her head bended downwards. She _was_ ashamed...ashamed of what she was.

Ron swallowed hard while a warm wave of compassion coursed through him as he looked at her small, broken figure. It had never crossed his mind- _not even once in all those years that they'd known each other_- that she actually felt ashamed of being muggle-born. She always acted with such pride, with such self-confidence, fully aware of what she was capable of, fully aware of her wits and strength. All those years, had she been wearing this armour of success and ambition, this thirst for knowledge, only to hide that she felt ashamed of herself? Ron felt remorse catching his heart when he thought at all those times he'd teased her for being a nerd, a total swot. He felt it even worse, because he knew what it meant to feel worthless, what it meant to long to be someone you could never be. He knew what it felt like to be nothing special. However, he would have never believed that she would think of herself that way. How could she ever think that way?

She was special in every way. Her beauty was overwhelming and it was not just her appearance. It was her soul, her whole being that shined through his darkest night. She was bright, like a single ray of light, coming from the sun to warm him, to guide him. Her light was not glaring nor was it dull, it was a pure tone, soft and comforting, calming, it inspired him. It made him better. _She_ made him want to be better. But her light was also fire, like a funny laugh, a bickering comment, she had true grit, she had this fire no other girl possessed. This pulsating fire could also burn him and it had done it so many times, but he never twitched back from the fire that was her, because he could also see the light that defined her.

"I don't care what you are. You are only Hermione for me." he finally said in a low, soft tone, shyly avoiding her glance that burnt right through him. He didn't even have to turn his face to her to know that her eyes filled with this well-known expression of hope and gratefulness. He was so barely aware of the effect that his words had on her. He never knew. But he felt it, felt how her breathing eased again, how the tension left her body in a long, soft sigh. He felt the change in her body that sat so close next to him, almost too close. The long silence that followed his words created an awkward tension of embarrassment and shyness, but still filled with her deep gratefulness and his honest feeling he had for her.

"No doubt a swot, a constant know-it-all. Terrible social skills..." he continued nervously, fearing the direction which his former words could have led to. Ron did what he always did, he broke the tension between them. He suppressed his longing feelings and hid them behind his wish to make her laugh or at least smile again.

"...Ron." she threatened half-heartedly and he could hear at the way she'd spoken his name that she obviously tried to suppress a smile.

"...a total loser considering sports...".

"Oh, be careful!" she exclaimed and slapped him playfully on the shoulder, desperately trying to keep a stern expression on her face. But it didn't work. Her lips widened shyly into that softly smile she only ever offered to him.

"...and the bravest, smartest, most beautiful, most wonderful girl I've ever met." he finished and immediately she blushed and broke off their eye contact. Strangely enough, her feet suddenly appeared extremely interesting to her. He almost got lost in the way her brown eyes shimmered, warmed and softened by the smile on her lips she still couldn't shake off. At some point she started talking again to cover her embarrassment.

"Sounds like you knew a lot.".

"What makes you think I didn't?".

Her smile turned into a disbelieving grimace and she quizzed her eyebrows in stern doubts. Ron looked at her in his natural confident manner, but as soon as he realised his silly counter question he quickly cast his look down. He grimaced his face, silently cursing himself for never thinking about his words before he spat them out. However, she only smiled and took a long look into the night, for a moment only enjoying the stillness of the forest.

"Ron.".

He looked up when he heard her saying his name ever so quietly. The tenderness of her voice let his name appear as something beyond beautiful in his own ears and he was already enchanted, before he'd even looked into her eyes. Her brown eyes burnt themselves hopefully into his own blue stones and he swallowed hard by the way she made him feel.

"Did you mean it?".

Ron didn't answer her question with any word, he simply took her hand into his, letting her feel the warmth of his skin. He then looked up to her and gave her a warm smile, saturated with the depth of his feelings for her and for a moment he knew, he just knew, that she'd recognised them. However, she didn't say a word either, but simply responded to the touch of his fingers with a soft, tender smile, shy and grateful. They didn't need any words. No more.


End file.
